He continued to play over the weekend, even as the Bristol Post's story about his attempt to persuade a woman he would only publicly call "Rapunzel" went viral, but has now stopped.

Luke said he had been punched in the head at around 4am today - but added that the reason he stopped was that he realised he had "spectacularly failed" in his original aim.

Speaking to the i, the 34-year-old musician rejected suggestions it was a PR stunt and issued an apology to those offended by his plan.

Luke Howard went viral for all the wrong reasons after his plan to win back his girlfriend by playing a piano in College Green non-stop was branded "creepy" by social media users

“I stopped playing yesterday because I realised that what I had wanted to do had spectacularly failed,” he said.

“The social media reaction turned it very quickly into something that would cause the one person I didn’t want to hurt embarrassment and pain. That was the last thing in the world I had wanted to happen, so I left.”